By Ahmad Ghaddar
LONDON (Reuters) – Oil prices stabilized on Wednesday as investors weighed optimism over a meeting between the leaders of major U.S. and Chinese consumers against an expected increase in production quotas at the next OPEC+ meeting.
Brent crude futures rose 11 cents, or 0.2%, to $64.51 a barrel by 1020 GMT, while U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude futures gained 6 cents, or 0.1%, to $60.21.
China’s Foreign Ministry said Chinese President Xi Jinping will meet U.S. President Donald Trump in the South Korean city of Busan on Thursday.
He said the meeting would “inject new impetus into the development of US-China relations,” adding that Beijing was willing to work together to achieve “positive results.”
China also said it was open to continued cooperation with the United States on fentanyl after Trump said he planned to reduce tariffs on Chinese goods in exchange for Beijing’s pledge to limit exports of precursor chemicals.
The expected decline in U.S. crude and fuel stocks last week also supported prices.
Crude inventories fell by 4.02 million barrels for the week ended October 24, market sources said Tuesday, citing figures from the American Petroleum Institute.
Gasoline stocks fell by 6.35 million barrels, while distillate stocks fell by 4.36 million barrels from the previous week, the sources said.
“The API report of significant price declines for crude and refined products last week in the United States provides modest support for prices,” said Giovanni Staunovo, an analyst at UBS.
Brent and WTI last week posted their biggest weekly gains since June after US President Donald Trump imposed Ukraine-related sanctions on Russia for the first time in his second term, targeting oil majors Lukoil and Rosneft.
Nonetheless, doubts about the ability of sanctions to offset oversupply and talk of increasing OPEC+ production have put pressure on prices; both benchmarks fell 1.9%, or more than $1, in the previous session.
OPEC+, the world’s largest group of oil-producing countries, is moving toward a modest output increase in December, four sources close to the negotiations said, with two sources citing an additional 137,000 barrels per day.
On Tuesday, the CEO of Saudi oil giant Aramco said demand for crude oil was strong even before sanctions were imposed on Russian oil majors and that Chinese demand was still healthy.
((Reporting by Ahmad Ghaddar, additional reporting by Sam Li, editing by Alexander Smith)
